At the southern border of Yakutsk, there was a settlement that could only be called a village — small enough, wooden enough, and close enough to the treeline to earn it. The cold there had none of the north’s bite. It was the kind of place that existed quietly and expected to be left alone.

"Isn’t this interesting... who would have thought you and I would end up at the same party? It must be fate."

Scar had tried to stay away from Luccy, making it as obvious as he could without saying it outright. She wouldn’t take the hint. Which made him hate himself for not finishing her off when he had the chance. At this point, she could track his progress without breaking a sweat.

"Why are they looking at us like that...?" Amber asked.

"It must be because of your beauty... the two of you are like walking perfection. Especially you, Amber."

Luccy added and leaned toward Amber, angling for a reaction the way she angled for most things. Amber’s face gave her nothing. Not even close.

Scar’s eyes narrowed slightly. They were out front, three people trailing behind. He’d already followed Luccy’s logic before she finished it. The moment they arrived, all eyes had settled on Amber first.

He couldn’t dispute it. Apart from Haven, Amber was the most charming person in any room she entered. Just slightly intimidating to go with it.

After observing them for a while, he realized that wasn’t the case.

Area 9 sat just within the forest. The history of it was grim: a Scarlet Kin had been defeated there, and what grew from its carcass was described simply as hell.

Most of the people who’d lived in the area had moved on to where the larger population now settled. The ones in this village had stayed.

"They call themselves the Children of Yeshe... and they refuse to leave the place the hero secured for them."

Storm said it from behind, walking the new recruit through the history. Long ebony hair, pitch dark eyes that carried something slightly soulless in them, and mysterious in a way that didn’t feel accidental.

Scar felt the chill every time she looked at him. She’d been looking at him for quite some time now. She was still doing it and showed no signs of stopping.

’I don’t know what her problem is. Maybe she has a crush on me.’

He shook his head. He was already taken, and that was the reminder he needed. He buried himself in other thoughts before anything else could follow.

The inhabitants called themselves Children of Yeshe, and so the place had taken the name with them. The village of Yeshe.

Yeshe was humanity’s savior, hailed as a hero across every telling of history. He founded the Alpha Academy and gave humans something they hadn’t had before: a reason not to cower.

He was the first Royal Knight and was so revered that he was often depicted not as a knight but as a Royal Emperor.

"They say he defeated the creature that caused Area 9... Amber is frequently compared to him."

Scar muttered and caught himself midway, eyes moving across the area without meaning to. More people had emerged from their homes, drawn out by the party’s arrival. Most of them wore masks over their noses.

"Thinking about it, how do these people survive? There’s no merchandise here... no one is even selling vegetables."

The crew paused and observed thoroughly as well.

"Perhaps they’re afraid of the creatures that have been coming after them..."

The new member, Solus, asked.

"It’s possible... they say the Scarlet Kins from the forests are drawn to breathing."

After Storm spoke, Luccy’s expression darkened.

"Those creatures aren’t even a threat. Even a toddler could squeeze them to death."

"Exactly. But it doesn’t seem like these people have the will to fight. They believe something in Area 9 is forcing the creatures into this village. We just have to eliminate it."

Breathing and speaking were among the most common concepts in existence, which was exactly the problem. The creatures that formed around them didn’t come alone.

They came in swarms, calibrated to the frequency of the action, enough to press back against every breath drawn.

The prevailing belief was that these creatures departed the Scarlet Kin domain as a single, enormous entity, and then the human domain’s constant breathing reached it. Every breath it sensed drove it to divide further, splitting into minions until there were millions of them. The division cost them strength.

Scar scratched his head. The annoyance was real. He wished for the Divine Wisdom and Authority Morningstar carried in times like these, but that wasn’t something he could fully claim yet. Not until he became the full embodiment of Disloyal.

Until then, a fraction was all he had access to. And even that felt generous, given how little wisdom he seemed to be operating with at the moment.

"Where are you going?"

Amber asked the moment Scar began walking toward the people.

"Just follow me."

He needed a good reputation, and not just because his survival depended on it. It was a step. One of the necessary ones toward becoming the Disloyal.

Scar made his way toward an elderly man standing by his house, cloth pulled over his nose. He hadn’t even opened his mouth before the man cut in with a sharp question.

"What are you doing here? We requested Royal Knights, not devils."

Scar managed an awkward smile. So much for wanting to make a good impression.

"I’m sorry... I didn’t mean to threaten you."

Scar turned slightly and motioned toward Amber, standing beside him.

"We aren’t here to work. We know our role, we’re just an escort service. This is Amber Rover. As a Child of Yeshe, I’m sure you’ve heard of her. She’s said to have the potential to become as strong as Yeshe someday."

The man’s mouth parted in shock, and Scar found it satisfying, more than he probably should have.

But the window closed fast. Another person jumped in before he could use it, and once that one started talking, the words just kept coming.

"The Invisible Nun?"

"I never thought I would see her in person."

"This is an honor."

"We are saved."

Scar was unceremoniously pushed out of the way as the people turned their attention to Amber, bowing like she was something divine.

’These bastards...’

"We were all staying away from them... and you just went and spoke up. Shouldn’t you have told us what you were planning to do?"

Scar didn’t need to look. It was Walker. The irony being that Walker was the highest ranked among them, 94th, sitting above Luccy, their actual leader, who had just barely cracked the top hundred at 98th. He was the oldest too. Twenty-seven years old with the temper of a child half that age.

Scar turned and apologized. He hated the bastard without reservation, but the trust and support of his own party members were too important to compromise over personal feelings.

He’d swallow it. For now.

"Don’t be like that, Walker. His actions helped, didn’t they? Now we understand why this place feels so soulless."

Walker threw his tantrum and had nothing to follow it with. The villagers had opened up entirely to Amber, problems spilling out one after another, and the picture that emerged was telling.

They believed they’d failed Yeshe’s legacy somehow. But the thing that had truly unsettled them was the suspicion that someone out there was deliberately working to make Yeshe look bad.

Worse, some of them had died from their dreams. A Dreamwalker would have been the natural conclusion, but a Dreamwalker couldn’t survive Area 9. That ruled it out.

What remained was something more deliberate. An Akuma, hiding somewhere in Area 9, was using the deaths as a tool.

It gave them all the reason they needed. Area 9 had a barrier around it, but that didn’t mean much if someone had broken through quietly.

A broken barrier wouldn’t show itself unless the caster chose to reveal it. Which meant it could already be compromised, and no one would know.

Area 9 had never been hostile, so no one paid much attention to it. But if a Dreamwalker had entered, they would have noticed regardless. The Children of Yeshe might be right. It had to be an Akuma.

’Perfect... for someone with shady plans.’

"Look here. These are supposed to be among the weakest Danger-level threats, but this one was hard to kill. We had to use a sword."

An elderly woman brought out the corpse of one of the creatures. It resembled a spider, legs fanned outward and raised, torso lifted at just the right height to clamp onto a human nose and drain it until the person suffocated.

They all looked alike, with the same legs, the same torso, and the same design. But something about this one wasn’t right. Scar couldn’t name it yet, but he felt it even with the distance between himself and the corpse.

It reminded him of something... the same dark energy he’d felt when he held the Chosen One tablet. Not identical, but close enough to mean something.

He reached for the corpse to confirm it. He was shooed away before he could get close.

It left him with one path. He needed to get his hands on something similar to that creature, needed to kill it, and feel what came after.

Because if his instinct was right, if the dark energy meant what he thought it meant, something was fundamentally wrong with this mission.